In this episode of The Same Day Podcast, Mat Zalk explains how to simplify rental move-outs and make transitions smooth. He discusses the importance of early communication with tenants, how to evaluate and address property damage, and strategies for optimizing the make-ready process to attract top-tier renters. Mat also shares valuable insights on balancing tenant rights with owner interests during security deposit transactions.
Simplifying the Move-Out Process and Ensuring Smooth Rental Transitions
Mat Zalk is the President and Property Manager at Keyrenter Property Management, which has offices in Tulsa, Oklahoma City, and Arkansas. He focuses on the acquisition and management of single and multi-family residential properties on behalf of himself and a small network of investors.
Before founding Keyrenter Tulsa, Mat was a Strategy Director at The Property Finder Group, where he worked closely with the CEO and senior management team on various international acquisitions, scaled local teams in the group’s Saudi Arabia and Egypt offices, and executed a number of strategic projects in the core business market of Dubai. Mat has been an active investor since 2014 and is a licensed real estate agent in Oklahoma.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- [1:47] What’s the critical first step in the move-out process?
- [3:40] The benefits of starting the leasing process early
- [5:16] What to expect on move-out day
- [8:52] Why the make-ready process is key to maintaining property value and attracting better renters
- [12:54] What costs can legally be covered by the security deposit, and how to navigate tenant disputes
- [13:30] The importance of final accounting and compliance with security deposit laws
In this episode…
Managing the move-out process can be one of the most challenging aspects of managing rental properties. From ensuring tenants leave the property in good condition to minimizing downtime between renters, every detail matters. How can landlords and property managers create a seamless experience while protecting their investments?
According to Mat Zalk, the key lies in proactive communication and structured systems. He highlights that starting the process with a 60-day notice to vacate allows enough time for marketing, repairs, and finding quality tenants. By setting clear expectations for tenants, such as providing detailed cleaning checklists and encouraging documentation of the property’s condition, property managers can build trust and prevent disputes. This approach ensures a smoother transition, minimizes turnover time, and sets the stage for successful tenancies.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
- Mat Zalk on LinkedIn
- Yonatan Schmidt on LinkedIn
- Keyrenter Property Management
- Keyrenter Property Management in Tulsa | Oklahoma City | Arkansas
- Keyrenter Property Management email address: [email protected]
- Chris Lile State Farm
Quotable Moments
- “Residents are our customers. We want to make sure that they’re taken care of, but ultimately, we have a fiduciary responsibility to our clients.”
- “We strive to have all of our properties back on the market within ten days for showings.”
- “We want them to notate the condition of the property because we want them to feel comfortable that we are not going to overcharge them.”
- “It’s important also to understand that normal wear and tear is the language that’s used in the Oklahoma Landlord Tenant Act.”
- “The better the condition presents at move-in, the better the tenant is going to take care of the property.”
Action Steps
- Start the move-out process early: This proactive approach reduces vacancy time and ensures a smooth transition, addressing the challenge of maintaining occupancy and maximizing rental income.
- Use clear communication with tenants: This clarity helps avoid disputes over security deposits and ensures tenants understand their responsibilities, fostering a smoother move-out experience.
- Conduct independent move-out inspections: Perform independent inspections after the tenant vacates to accurately assess the property’s condition without tenant interference.
- Implement a comprehensive make-ready process: This process enhances the property’s appeal, potentially leading to higher rental rates and attracting quality tenants, thereby improving the overall ROI.
- Manage security deposits carefully: By managing this process meticulously, property managers can reduce legal risks and enhance tenant satisfaction.
Sponsor for this episode…
Chris Lile at State Farm Insurance:
This episode is brought to you by Chris Lile at State Farm Insurance.
Chris Lile at State Farm helps you protect your most precious assets and investments, including home and auto.
To learn more about how you can save double digits on all your insurance needs, visit diallile.com or call Chris’ office at 918-878-7771.
Keyrenter Property Management:
This episode is also brought to you by Keyrenter Property Management.
Keyrenter Property Management is a full-service property management company that helps clients buy, renovate, and operate real estate assets.
The team helps clients build wealth while taking the headache out of property management.
That’s why, no matter what rental you have — single-family homes, condos, townhomes, or apartments — they can give you the management solutions you need.
To learn more about their services, go to https://keyrenterpmc.com/ or send them an email at [email protected].
Episode Transcript
Intro 00:05
Welcome to The Same Day Podcast, where we discuss driving incremental business growth and other topics related to real estate, property management and entrepreneurship. Now to the show at hand.
Mat Zalk 00:20
Mat Zalk here. I’m the host of The Same Day Podcast, where I connect with top business experts and real estate leaders. Today’s episode is brought to you by Chris Lile State Farm. Chris Lile State Farm helps you protect your most precious assets and investments, whether it’s your home and auto investment, rental properties, or other valuables. Call Chris Lile State Farm for a quick and painless phone call to potentially save double digits on all of your insurance needs. Visit diallile.com or call his office at (918) 878-7771. Today’s episode is also brought to you by Keyrenter Property Management. Here at Keyrenter, we are a full-service property management company helping our clients buy, renovate and operate real estate assets. We help our clients build wealth while taking the headache out of property management. Today we are going to be talking about the move out experience. There’s a ton to cover. I’m going to jump right into it, and I’m going to share this screen that I have just to my right if I can. Boom. So you can see our move out experience.
And you’ll be able to kind of follow through as I walk this six-step path with you. We don’t want tenants to move out, but we know that it happens. We’re here to steward you as our owner through this process. We’re also here to steward the tenant through this process to make sure that it’s seamless. It’s as seamless as possible, and that we get a great tenant back into the property as soon as possible, and that the tenant that’s moving out, the resident that’s moving out, knows what to expect and what they can do to get their security deposit back in full.
If you watched last week’s lease renewal process video, you’ll know that we want to push all of our move outs and the renewals associated move ins, etc. to the peak leasing season, which is the summer generally, and we do that so that we can ensure that we get high traffic on our rentals, we get high traffic on the showings of our rentals and therefore get the associated peak rental rates for each property. You’ll know that we want to get ahead of the curve on renewals, and we want at least 60 days notice from a tenant and move out, and that’s part of our lease document. It says that they’ll give us 60 days advance notice, and we hold them to that because we want to create the best possible experience for our owners, who are ultimately our real clients. Residents are our customers. We want to make sure that they’re taken care of, but ultimately we have a fiduciary responsibility to our clients.
We want to make sure that we know well in advance of a move out, so that we can get the property back on the market as soon as possible. The notice that a resident gives us may be in the form of a phone call, an email or a notice through our online portal. But whatever happens, whatever way it comes in, we’re going to make sure that it gets formalized in writing. And that formalization does a couple of things. One, of course, it’s in writing and everything in real estate needs to be in writing.
But also it gives residents an idea about what to expect when they move out of the property. What we expect as the property management company in terms of handing over keys and cleanliness, etc. It also starts a process such that our clients are notified that there’s an upcoming vacancy, and they’re kept in the loop in our efforts to release that property.
So we start the leasing process here, number one, with a notice, sorry, the move out process with the notice to vacate. And that’s great, generally comes 60 days or more in advance. And then we immediately trigger the leasing process. The very first thing that we want to do is to start the leasing process early, so that we build up a list of potential future residents for that property for a bunch of reasons, a variety of reasons, I should say.
We only show occupied properties in a small number of specific cases, but we get photos and videos of the properties online as soon as possible, so that we can create a waiting list for those potential residents that would be interested in seeing it when it’s available. We know that the best residents there are, of course, exceptions, but the best residents are going to know in advance that they’re going to be moving. They need a bigger house, they need a different school district, whatever. And they know in advance, and they’re not super pressured to do it. They’re ahead of the curve in searching for a new property, so they don’t mind seeing a property that may be a month or two in advance so that they can get notified when it’s ready.
They can see it. If somebody really reaches out and we’re able to coordinate and schedule, we may also show the property to a high, high potential prospect early on when the residents begin, when they give us notice to vacate and they begin the real process of moving out, we’re going to communicate expectations. They learn about those expectations in the process of communicating with us. They know they’re going to be responsible for cleaning, for paying final rent balances and for handing in the keys. We at Key Renter generally hang a lockbox so that the tenant can move out without needing to drive to our offices to leave keys, and it makes it a more seamless experience for them.
They put the key in the lockbox, and the moving truck goes away down the road to their next property. Number four is the day of move out. On the day of move out, we communicate with the residents that they can take photo and video evidence to their heart’s content, and we want them to do that. We want them to notate the condition of the property, because we want them to feel comfortable that we are not going to overcharge them or overcharge their deposits in order to, you know, with any malignant intent, I guess, is the way I’d say it, we are not going to walk the property with them, but we want rather to conduct our own move out inspection once they’ve handed over the keys. So we’ve had tons of experiences in the past.
We’ve learned from our mistakes. When we go to the property with the resident that’s moving out, they say things like, oh yeah, that box is going to be gone. You know, it’s the final thing. I’m going to move out and that box never gets moved out.
They say, yeah, I just have to run to Home Depot and put the plate cover on that outlet, and that never gets done. They say, oh, I’m just going to clean out the fridge. That’s the last thing I’m going to do because I don’t want food to spoil. And then lo and behold, the food spoils and it’s in the fridge. So we don’t want any of that.
We want to know what the property looks like once they’ve handed over the keys. And that’s critical. We don’t want them interfering with our move out process. We don’t want them negotiating with us on issues that were or were not there at move in. And generally, we don’t want them to get in the way of our ability to test equipment like stoves or lights, whether they have light bulbs or not, etc.
And finally, we don’t want them interfering with our photography of the property in its condition as is today. For posterity, we are going to compare the move out inspection with the move in inspection, and we’re going to make a decision or determination about what damage in excess of normal wear and tear exists at the property at the time of the move out. It’s important also to understand that normal wear and tear is the language that’s used in the Oklahoma Landlord Tenant Act, and only damage in excess of wear and tear can be charged for against the security deposit that a tenant has held in our trust. It’s a pretty broad term. For example, you’d expect a family of four to have minor scuffs on the walls and potentially some minor sheetrock damage, but you wouldn’t expect normal wear and tear to extend to broken windows or holes in walls like big holes in walls.
Normal wear and tear are pinholes in walls for hanging photos. That is the normal course of events. When you live in a home, you probably hang up photos or art or something else. And so we sometimes get into this situation where we’re explaining to our owners why we’re doing work that the tenant should have paid for, when in fact those things are considered normal wear and tear, and it’s not the responsibility of the tenant to pay for those minor repairs. And that’s been upheld time and time again in the courts.
So we have to kind of draw that line in the sand or create that boundary. So owners understand what is and what is not normal wear and tear. In our case, tenants are given a move out cleaning checklist so they know what the expectation is at move out. And that’s super important.
We don’t want grease on blinds. We don’t want grease on vented hoods, we don’t want grease on countertops, etc. so they know what it looks like to have a clean home when they move out. What we handed to them at move in, we know refrigerator has to be cleaned, cleared out, etc. the oven same thing. And if not we will do that for them and we will bill that to them. But that’s in excess of normal wear and tear.
The property was given to them clean. It should be handed back clean after our move out inspection, we will move into step five, which is the make ready process. We determine if there’s a need for any minor make ready prior to the next residence occupancy of the property. We don’t want to leave a property without touch of paint or other minor make ready improvements, because those properties take longer to lease, they lease for less monthly rent, and they rent to lower quality tenants who are more likely to abuse them. It’s the broken glass syndrome.
If you walk into any physical property and you see that there’s broken glass, you’re more likely to think, oh, the owner doesn’t care for this property. I’m going to toss my McDonald’s wrapper on the floor. I’m going to not think so much about breaking that next window, etc.
So we don’t want to give them any impression that we aren’t taking care of the property, and we don’t want to give them the impression that they can do damage to the property. So the better the condition presents at move in, the better the tenant is going to take care of the property, and the more likely we are to find a great tenant that is then more likely to take care of the property. On the make ready process, it generally takes a few days to a few weeks, depending on the nature of the work that needs to get done. We strive to have all of our properties back on the market within ten days for showings, but sometimes there are delays because of specialty parts. Think of ovens.
Kind of countertop ovens. Sorry, stove tops, I should say specialty sized ovens, things like that. That can take a while. Glass repair. There’s some things that just.
It’s hard to get on the schedule. And when we do it, maybe a few days out and that postpones the work being done. It’s in its entirety. During the make ready process, we will put together a comprehensive list of what needs to happen, and we will submit it to you as our owner to get approval for that list there. This is a partnership.
I like to think of it as a partnership. And sometimes you may say I recently had something done at my house. Can you check if there’s a cheaper price? Do we need glass in that window instead of acrylic. Do you need to spend money replacing the stove when we could repair it?
I mean, there are things that owners will ask us that we’re happy to accommodate. It’s a function of the owner’s strategy, and we’re often not intimately aware with the owner’s strategy, despite our desire to be. And we get information from the owner property information document that goes out when we do the onboarding process. But sometimes strategies change. And sometimes owners have good thoughts and ideas about how to save some money or where they want to spend more money.
Potentially, if we’re going to change the countertops, do we want to just put in granite, for example? We can get more in rent. We’re less likely to have to change them every couple of years because they’re a sturdier, more durable countertop surface, and that may be a good push from the owner’s side. If the owner feels so inclined to make that push during the make ready process. We’ve seen many of our owners and many of our larger owners spend a good bit extra during a make ready on painting the whole house instead of painting a room or doing touch up on changing fixtures, fans, lights, vented hoods, you know, fans in the bathroom for sucking the humidity out of a bathroom.
Blind upgrades, countertops again, all that in the hopes of getting more rent. And we can be a partner for you. In thinking through what rental comparables would suggest a price, a rental price would be if you made those upgrades. And we’re happy to talk about that. And we have vendors that can do all of the upgrades, whether in-house vendors or external third party.
For example, we don’t cut our own granite and install our own granite, but we’ve got great low cost, low cost builder grade options. If an owner wanted to do that, and the average resident of a property of a rental property feels much better about a builder grade granite than Formica countertops and they last much longer again. So we strive to get our properties back on the market within ten days after we get communication from you, our owner, our client about spending the money necessary to make that work. There’s a discussion about how much will be covered by the security deposit, and how much will have to come out of pocket from an owner. If you think about a property that’s been leased for 3 or 4 years, there’s been a collection of income over the course of time.
And at the end of that lease, when it comes vacant, you have to make ready. Sometimes an owner has to give back a little bit of that money to make the property ready again. That’s all part and parcel of owning rental properties. Investment properties and owners should also be thinking about the long term cost of ownership. That means every 15 years you’re going to have to replace HVAC systems.
You’re going to have to replace hot water tanks, you’re going to have to replace a roof. Eventually. All these things need to be calculated in the return on investment formula, calculations that happen from the ownership side, the deposit and final accounting, which is step number six in our move out experience, is something that we as property managers handle on behalf of the owner. With the tenant, we’ve got 45 days to return a security deposit by law, and we also have to provide residents with a disposition letter that indicates what security deposit was returned and what the detailing is of any money that we’ve used from the security deposit to remedy a property. We generally try to get those done within 30 days.
We can do them faster if the make ready is very quick, and we know the full summation of the costs and how we allocate responsibility of those costs for the make ready. But we do have buffer in some of our circumstances for returning that security deposit, the disposition as it’s called. If you are a current client, this is how we handle the move out experience at Key Renter. If you are watching this and you’re not a client, these are the things that you should be considering. If you’re managing the property yourself, and if you are tired of managing this yourself, and if you feel like there’s exposure and liability associated with things like the disposition and accounting for security deposit.
And you’d like to pass that off to a professional. We’re always happy to have that discussion. It’s worth noting that in the many, many properties that we manage, we do get sued on occasion. And oftentimes it is about the disposition of a security deposit, all sorts of things from, hey, I thought that was unfair that you billed me for this to hey, I didn’t move into the property and you took my security deposit as a result. What gives?
So we handle that process. We deal with our attorneys, sue and get sued on behalf of our clients, and take that headache out of the general process of property management so that you don’t have to deal with it. Think about it and go to bed worrying about it on a nightly basis. So that’s it for us. Keyrenter.
It’s our move out experience. Thanks for watching.
Outro 15:36
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